ELISÉE MACLET (Lyons-en-Santerre, 1881 - Paris 1962).
"Trees before the Sacré Coeur Basilica".
Oil on canvas. Relined.
Signed in the lower left corner.
Measurements: 55 x 46 cm.
The Parisian district of Montmartre deeply inspired the young and promising Elisée Maclet, who had just landed in the French capital in 1906. Scenery such as the cabarets of Lapin Agile or the Moulin de la Galette, the Sacré Coeur Basilica, the streets of old Paris or the views of the Seine river were masterfully immortalised by Maclet through a Post-Impressionist style of a certain childlike simplicity. Considered a key figure in the development of the style of the painter Maurice Utrillo, a firm representative of Montmartre life in 1900, Elisée Maclet left an important artistic mark on the Paris of the time. As his success grew in Parisian social circles, his artistic role solidified, to the point that the great Parisian gallery owners hung his works alongside those of Van Gogh and Picasso. On this occasion, Elisée Maclet offers us a view of the emblematic Sacré Coeur Basilica, one of the places most frequently visited by the artists of the time, thanks to its location at the top of the Montmartre hill. In it, the painter captures the underlying essence of one of the most magical places in the French capital, using a daring technique and a totally harmonious palette of colours.
Élisée Maclet initially developed a "primitivist" style of painting which earned him a place among the "naïff" painters of the beginning of the century. In 1906, Maclet moved to Paris. There he settled in the Montmartre district and produced most of the landscape and street scenes for which he is best known. Maclet's Parisian scenes were successful, especially after the First World War, and he maintained this success for the rest of his career due to the unique sensibility and original techniques he demonstrated in his works. Many of the French writers appreciated his paintings and often wrote about him, including Max Jacob, Sidonie Gabrielle Colette and Francis Carco. From 1918 to 1919, Maclet painted seascapes in Dieppe, living in a house that Carco lent him. He returned to Montmartre in 1919. In 1920, the art dealer Dosbourg bought some of his first Montmartre scenes. He lived in Arles from 1923 to 1928, where he painted many remarkable landscapes expressing his enchantment with nature and Mediterranean culture, some of which sometimes recall Matisse. In 1928, Maclet received his first major solo exhibition, held at the Gallerie Barreiro in Paris, where more than 50 of his works were exhibited. At the end of the year, he left mainland France on a painting excursion to the island of Corsica. He then went to Brittany, where he lived and worked in 1929 and 1930. In 1957 the first major retrospective of Maclet's work was held at the Nicolas Poussin Gallery in Paris, and in 1960 the same gallery presented his work in its exhibition "Paintings of the 20th Century"; another major retrospective took place in 1961, at the Thibaut Gallery in New York City. In the period following his international breakthrough, Maclet was the subject of numerous magazine articles and, in time, several public collections in Europe and America acquired examples of his work, including museums in Chicago, Bremen, Geneva, Sweden, Norway and Monte. After his death in 1962, Maclet posthumously received several international tributes, including solo exhibitions in Paris, Germany and Venezuela, as well as a major exhibition at the Vestart Galleries in New York City in 1969. In 2011, the National Gallery of Bermuda mounted a solo exhibition of his work. Today, his work is represented in a number of important international collections, both public and private, with many of his paintings held by the Musée d'Art Moderne in Paris.